Tuesday, April 3, 2012

Stumbling blocks

After re-directing a friend to one of my blog posts, he walked away with completely the wrong message. I was trying to point out that without Christ my friend is lost and hopeless. Instead he walked away confused as he was introduced to the Calvinist / Arminian debate on the nature and state of the free will of man, in the midst of an abortion debate. I can understand him being confused.

Which leads me to think: if someone walks away with the wrong message, who is to blame? I have to admit that I am at least partly to blame for not being clear in what I am trying to get across.

But then I realize: God is in control, even to the point where my friend may remain blind. All I can do is take the horse to water, how the horse gets himself tangled in the weeds is not something I intened, nor was it the point of what I was trying to accomplish. God knows what everyone needs and when they need it. I am not going to abandon the garden just because something went wrong1. I know that creation, abortion, denominationislm, calvinism etc. all create FAR MORE heated arguments within and without the church, and they ought to be issues that get addressed. If someone peeks their head in and gets the wrong message, that is really not my fault.

Nor is it God's. They have the full access to the right information. The point of my blog about infants was not to stir the arminian / calvin debate, but rather to display the glory of God in the consistency of salvation for ALL MEN (babies included). What that blog is saying is that infants that die go to heaven because they are saved by a gracious Father. The question one should walk away with is not how to hate arminian theology, but to strike the correct kind of fear in the heart for that person to say

"if I can only get to heaven the way those children gets into heaven, surely I am without hope."

The fear that results from that would cause any person to seek an alternative, and the desire would cause them to call out

"Lord, I am a sinner, I am without hope, I cannot save myself! Only you can save. Please save me."

This is my gospel, that God answers that prayer, and that it is not the praying of the prayer that saves, but the God who gave you the fear of Himself that saves. For you cannot pray this prayer meaningfully unless God gives you the ability. This is so there may be no boasting in your salvation other than boasting about the work Christ has done, not the work / prayer that you have done.

Movies

My Hermeneutic

Hermeneutics is the rules we use when interpreting the scriptures. It is important that every Christian handle the word of the Lord properly.

Intention and authorship. I believe, that the 66 books of the bible are the inspired works of God, working through His servants to:

Reveal Himself as the one and only God eternal

Tell His people of His son Jesus Christ and the salvation that He provided

Instruct ALL people on the manner in which they ought to live, the judgment for disobedience belonging to God alone

Since these books have come primarily from God, they are inerrant and infallible, meaning there are no errors regarding the individual words and verses, as well as no errors in continuity. Any error perceived only reveals the readers response to the text in a manner that is unwilling to submit to the authority of the God who inspired it. In other words, the problem with 'errors' in biblical texts lies solely with the interpreter and not the author.

Regarding interpretation. While many interpretations exist, there can be only one proper interpretation of a biblical text. That is, a grammatical historical interpretation. The text must be read as it is written, in manner consistent with the interpretation of the original recipients. To understand a text beyond the audience to whom it was written is incorrect, unless another passage of scripture allows for such an interpretation. Scripture must be used to interpret other scriptures, using the scriptures which convey meaning the most fluently to interpret the scriptures which are difficult to understand. The bible must be read with the very principles it promotes: humility on the part of the believer. The more one reads biblical texts the more one's understanding will increase. It is the believers duty to seek God in prayer in order to understand a text.

Regarding textual portions in which inclusion is questionable. Grace and understanding need to be applied in the contention of these portions of scripture. They should be dealt with like any other segment in scripture in the sense that they are not to be considered in isolation. The context of the passage must be considered as well as other doctrines of scripture. These texts should not be used as the primary texts for new doctrine, or be the sole foundation of new doctrine.